Dick, As a personal friend of Art's and knowing what Art believes, I
find what you wrote below to be an attrocious misrepresentation of the
School, of Art and of Art's views. If you are going to criticize
someone please take the time to learn what they are saying.

I will say that I disagree deeply with Art's views about the world but
Art and I have had dinner many times and I have found him to be a
gentleman, a godly man and someone who is honest enough to admit the
difficulties. He even changes his mind unlike some I know.

Dick Fischer wrote:

>I think you missed the point. Art is on staff at a Seventh Day >Adventist University. The official position of the school is strict six >24-hour day creation.

Bull roar. Art believes in an old earth. The age of the earth is NOT
part of Adventist belief. The global flood is part of their belief and
that is what drives Art to explain geology with rapid processes. It is
NOT as you misrepresent, the need for a 24-hour day creation. I have
been at dinner with Art and a few of his friends with Art encouraging me
to convince his colleagues that the universe was old! Get your facts
straight before criticising.

>In his position he is not allowed to reach an >independent conclusion, regardless of the validity of the data.

Re the age of the earth, Art has reached an independent conclusion.>The >evidence on coral growth, for example, is a dagger in the heart to >Seventh Day dogma. If Art was a student at that university, he would be >free to examine the argument, conclude he had been misled, and transfer >to Baylor.

>But the faculty and staff is committed to a philosophical perspective >due to their religious belief irrespective of whatever science comes up >with. Their hands are in the till. So, teach religion at Seven-Day U. >Teach English. Teach drama. Teach business. But you can't teach Geology >unless you have no vestige of honor. And then to appear on this forum >as if his hands were clean, without disclosing his motives, is >reprehensible. He is sold out. He has bowed before the golden idle. He >has accepted his thirty pieces of silver, and still wishes to sip the >wine and break bread at the table of respectability.

This is unbecoming Dick. You start from a flawed assumption and then
draw a wrong conclusion and act as if you are the moral judge here. Art
knows the difficulties, Art wants solutions to his problems. But as an
act of faith, Art believes in the global flood. Art has criticized YEC
articles that didn't stand up to scrutiny. [Arthur V. Chadwick,
"Precambrian Pollen in the Grand Canyon - A Reexamination," Origins,
8:1, 1981, pp 7-8 (7-12)] Art does not deserve the treatment you are
giving him.

>To teach Geology at a school that disavows the very underpinnings of >the science itself would be the same thing as having Julian Huxley >teaching Basic Christian Doctrine at MIT. Let Art fiddle with the minds >of those so mired in religious entrapment it won't make any difference, >but let him have the decency to leave this forum to those committed to >honest engagement.

I enjoy the debates I have had with Art. I have always learned much
from them. I hope he stays. But with nastiness like this, I wouldn't
blame him for leaving. I agree with the others, you owe him a public
apology. Will we get one from you?